Story submitted by Rob Ricket
Mann plays the victim in article from “The Scientist”
Opinion: Life as a Target
Attacks on my work aimed at undermining climate change science have turned me into a public figure. I have come to embrace that role.
By Michael E. Mann| March 27, 2013
As a climate scientist, I have seen my integrity perniciously attacked. Politicians have demanded I be fired from my job because of my work demonstrating the reality and threat of human-caused climate change. I’ve been subjected to congressional investigations by congressman in the pay of the fossil fuel industry and was the target of what The Washington Post referred to as a “witch hunt” by Virginia’s reactionary Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli. I have even received a number of anonymous death threats.
My plight is dramatic, but unfortunately, it is not unique; climate scientists are regularly the subject of such attacks.
This cynicism is part of a destructive public-relations campaign being waged by fossil fuel companies, front groups, and individuals aligned with them in an effort to discredit the science linking the burning of fossil fuels with potentially dangerous climate change.
My work first appeared on the world stage in the late 1990s with the publication of a series of articles estimating past temperature trends. Using information gathered from records in nature, like tree rings, corals, and ice cores, my two coauthors and I had pieced together variations in the Earth’s temperature over the past 1,000 years. What we found was that the recent warming, which coincides with the burning of fossil fuels during the Industrial Revolution, is an unprecedented aberration in this period of documented temperature changes, and recent work published in the journal Science suggests that the recent warming trend has no counterpart for at least the past 11,000 years, and likely longer. In a graph featured in our manuscript, the last century sticks out like the blade of an upturned hockey stick.
Source:
http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/34853/title/Opinion–Life-as-a-Target/
========================================================
This header from Dr. Mann has some important legal value:
Attacks on my work aimed at undermining climate change science have turned me into a public figure. I have come to embrace that role.
A public figure has a higher burden of proof in defamation cases, such as the one where Dr. Mann is suing Dr. Tim Ball and Mark Steyn at The National Review. For example:
According to the public figure doctrine, prominent public persons must prove actual malice on the part of the news media in order to prevail in a libel lawsuit. Actual malice is the knowledge of falsity or reckless disregard of whether a statement is true or false. The public figure doctrine makes it possible for publishers to provide information on public issues to the debating public, undeterred by the threat of liability.
Source: http://definitions.uslegal.com/p/public-figure-doctrine/
Further, Dr. Mann is going to have to prove that the statements by Tim Ball and NRO weren’t parody or satire:
Whether parodies should be potentially actionable as defamation depends on whether the statement is deemed factual and thus potentially actionable, or is a matter of protected opinion and not actionable.
Although plagued by confusion and lack of consensus, under the prevailing trends of constitutional law and/or state substantive defamation law principles, four core bases have emerged for classifying a statement as protected opinion:
(a) it did “not contain a provably false factual connotation;”
(b) it “cannot ‘reasonably [be] interpreted as stating actual facts;’”
(c) it consists merely of “rhetorical hyperbole, a vigorous epithet,” or “imaginative expression;”
(d) it does not state or imply undisclosed, unassumed, or unknown defamatory facts.
Source: http://epubs.utah.edu/index.php/ulr/article/viewFile/74/66
I think with his public figure admission, combined with the recognized first amendment right to satire and parody of public figures, he just took his two legal cases out back and shot them dead.
The issue has never been whether he’s a “public figure” – of course he is; this article makes no difference there.
The issue is whether he can try to prove “actual malice” — and beat the anti-SLAPP standards — with his “Backdoor Sedition Act” argument. (“The government says I’m innocent; if you publicly don’t believe them, you get sued.”)
REPLY: actually it does make a difference. His defense could have argued that he doesn’t meet certain tests for a public figure, for example, citing a random poll of people who might be queried about his name, few if any of the general public might know it.
But now, with his headline self admission of actually being, they can’t even begin to argue that he might not be. He’s labeled himself, and there’s no legal solvent to get that label off – Anthony
Somewhere there is a room full of lawyers putting face to palm and across town another room full of lawyers popping a cork.
@dfbaskwilll – I think he would do better cleaning bus station toilets and the porta-potties set out for homeless people. Somebody has to save the planet, right?
@merovign – The term “reactionary” does pretty accurately define today’s leftists. They call themselves “liberal,” but they are the exact opposite of liberal in the classic sense. True liberals strove to expand freedoms (Civil Rights Act, 1964) and help people keep as much as possible of the fruits of their labor (Kennedy tax cut, 1961). Insofar as the likes of Mann and the other AGW fanatics hanker for a return to the bad old days of socialist tyranny and kleptocracy, and insofar as they cling to inhumane ideas long since discredited, they fit the dictionary definition of “reactionary,” in the political sense, perfectly. Their involuntary, knee-jerk reaction to anything or anyone they disagree with also pretty neatly fits the word, in its original meaning.
Mann had better watch his step accusing skeptics and congressmen of being in the pay of the big energy companies, lest he be sued for libel or slander himself. If he were to accuse me personally of that, I would lose no time coming after him and his deep pockets. As far as that goes, even if the big oil and coal companies are funding efforts to stop the AGW madness, my hat is off to them – they’re doing much more than protecting their business, they’re doing a huge public service, especially for the poor people who will be hurt the most by Agenda 21 and the other counterhuman undertakings of the green cabal.
I hate to tell him, but the fossil fuel industry doesn’t care one whit, as businesses, whether or not government tries to lower fossil fuel use or replace them. The businesses of this industry are the best at energy technology, and if new viable forms of energy are developed, they’ll be the ones to do it. They’ve tried everything academia is doing now in fuel development, 40 years or more ago, going into much more depth and a more rigorous study than any I came across in my role as a Bioprocessing expert at a university. They know govt is spinning its wheels. Whatever new rules come along, people will need fossil fuels and petrochemical products, and they make money by being the very best and most energy efficient sources of those products–whatever taxes are thrown in the way. The reason they hate climate alarmism, like the rest of us, is that it’s based on nothing and it will potentially hurt the world economy and subject free people to more government rule.
“…with the emotional intelligence of a teen aged girl.”
That actually describes quite a few engineer types (I work in engineering.) Just saying. (Yes, I do have teenage girls for reference.)
As defensive as the statements is, and silly, I think what it doesn’t say reflects his real point.
It doesn’t say he is a non-public figure who shouldn’t receive these types of ‘attacks.’ He is stating quite plainly that he is. So I would think the reasoning behind this write is to accept the fact that he is not going to win the lawsuit with Dr. Tim Ball and Mark Steyn.
In it re-enforces ‘standard talking points’ and asserts a ‘victim’ stance to protect his position when he losses, in addition to making the case subliminally that he lost because of big oil.
Maybe not intentionally at all. Infact, most likely not. When we (for example, the you or I) pen a ‘whoa is me’ point like this, it rarely is with a large plan, but a defensive concession that we were not right, but still right, and still want to end up winning in our hearts and those we are writing to.
If he felt he was winning, he was truly right, his comments would reflect not a victim, but that of a victor, like the “If you are running into Flack you are on the right path” type of commentary.
Would be interesting to wonder what he thinks about all of this. Alas, we can only guess. Good thing for forums, eh? 🙂
I see this as another step on his path to extricate himself from his ill advised lawsuits while saving face. First he can say he needs to drop the suits to save the other innocents whose work may be dragged in the mud with him through discovery, and now he can say that since he is a public figure it will be too hard to win so there will be no shame in dropping the suits.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/01/16/michael-mann-gets-slapped/
He is setting himself up as a martyr for the cause, having to bear the slings and arrows of his opponents but unable to defend himself for the good of the community and the cruel tort laws stacked against him.
Dr. Michael Mann is not a climate scientist. Neither is Dr. James Hansen (as Warmists like to point out about some sceptics). James Hansen is an astronomer.
Oh, I forgot, Dr. Michael Mann is a physicist, mathematician, and geologist but NOT a climate scientist (as Warmists like to point out about some sceptical scientists). So there. 😉
There are two strategies afoot here ginned up by his legal team. One mentioned above is that he will bow out of the fight before he has to allow any discovery of the precious secrets his records. The other strategy is to use the cloak of a victim of the giants of big oil to get the main stream press behind him in the war of words. This is the number one ploy in the liberal playbook to affect public opinion. This is only a backup plan if the trial goes forward and if juries are involved in the law suits. Of course, in the meantime, he will be a hero to those who religiously believe in AGW and/or who want to share in the glut of carbon taxes on the average taxpaying person.
Professor Phil Jones is a climatologist who avoids FOIA and deletes emails and data……….because you might try to find something wrong with it. And finds sceptics deaths good news really.
This reminds me of the plaintif bleatings of Prosper-René Blondlot (N-rays) and Wilhelm Reich (Orgone) when their precious theories were rejected.Oh, how they suffered for their science.
Lusenko must have had similar feelings. From Wikipedia:
In 1962 three of the most prominent Soviet physicists, Yakov Borisovich Zel’dovich, Vitaly Ginzburg, and Pyotr Kapitsa, presented a case against Lysenko, proclaiming his work as false science. They also denounced Lysenko’s application of political power to silence opposition and eliminate his opponents within the scientific community …
The Soviet press was soon filled with anti-Lysenkoite articles and appeals for the restoration of scientific methods to all fields of biology and agricultural science. In 1965 Lysenko was removed from his post as director of the Institute of Genetics at the Academy of Sciences and restricted to an experimental farm in Moscow’s Lenin Hills (the Institute itself was soon dissolved). After Khrushchev’s dismissal in 1964, the president of the Academy of Sciences declared that Lysenko’s immunity to criticism had officially ended.
Read the whole thing and consider a donation to Wikipedia.
My opinion of his opinion: tripe
I would consider some who belong the propagation AGW are guilty of treason because they are bringing nations down.
To show that people are in error in they say, you have to first demonstrate that the contrary view is the only truth possible. Dr Mann has started cases based on the belief that his work is unassailable. Tim Ball’s and Mark Steyn’s lawyers will find rich pickings in Montford’s “Hockey Stick Illusion” that shows that Mann’s work is far from unassailable. In fact the conclusions are based on a compound of weak foundations. Stripping any one of them away either severely weakens or collapses the whole structure.
Rajendra Kumar Pachauri is a not a climate scientist but a railway engineer who heads the world’s top climate change body, the IPCC. He has been heavily into the oil business and extraction.
Al Gore is not a climate scientist but a theologian and failed presidential candidate and successful hypocrite and brazen liar of the highest order.
I can’t see Mann going away any more than Paul Ehrlich has. Ehrlich’s “career” has been nothing but one failed prediction after another for nigh on 40+ years now. If constant, repeated failure can’t rid us of him, why should Mann be any different?
John Cook of Skeptical Science says he is not a climate scientist.
PS I am not a climate scientist. I will shut up when these other non-climate scientists shut up. 😉
Dr. Peter Gleick is not a climate scientist but is into water though.
Kent Clizbe says:
March 27, 2013 at 2:48 pm
At least Obama is listening to the alarmist, put-upon, poor Mr Mann:….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
That is nothing new. It is just a regurgitation of Clinton’s UN Biodiversity Treaty and Wildlands Project that gives the United Nations about 1/2 of the USA as a wild life preserve and locks up Americans in small enclaves. SEE MAP (Humans get to live in the small green areas)
This is a close-up of the corridor system in the South West MAP that gives a pretty good idea of the ratio of land set aside for humans vs the elites wilderness playground (You really didn’t think THEY aren’t going to use it did you?)
This is a list of the various bills that have been introduced over the years link
The taking of property has already started L.A. County’s Private Property War
The plans for our
slave’s quarters“micro-unit” mini-apartment are already being tried out in New York City. photo of people in life size foot print of apartmentIt is the complete takeover of the USA by stealth and is called Agenda 21. See Liberal democrat and California bureaucrat Rosa Koire’s speech on Agenda 21. If a liberal activist and a bureaucrat to boot thinks it is evil we should ALL be against it. (I found everything in her speech to be true) If you can’t watch the video read this THE POST SUSTAINABLE FUTURE Cornell’s Food Shed: …Based on population distribution data, we then estimate the “foodshed” needed to feed a whole population center…. Finding information like that on Cornell University’s website makes Obama’s Science Czar’s plans seem very close to fruition. Just add energy restriction, no jobs and a carbon tax and home ownership becomes impossible.
JamesS says (March 27, 2013 at 3:43 pm): “I can’t see Mann going away any more than Paul Ehrlich has.”
Exactly. In government-funded “science”, political correctness is more important than scientific correctness.
Actually, that’s probably true of government-funded anything, right?
actually it does make a difference. His defense could have argued that he doesn’t meet certain tests for a public figure…
No, not in this case it doesn’t. His complaint practically gives that game away with the notorious “Nobel Prize” comment — remember, you can be a limited purpose public figure without being a household name. In this case, the “limited purpose” would be the CAGW controversy, but that’s the very area this whole defamation thing is about. The analysis would be different if Steyn were attacking Mann’s family life, for example.
Do you think, before this article, the author of The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars and a co-founder of RealClimate could say he hasn’t “thrust himself to the forefront of a particular controversy in order to influence the resolution of the issues involved”? Of course he couldn’t, not with a straight face. “Public figure” status has never been a real issue in this case. This article doesn’t change that.
@Jimbo –
So Phil Jones is applauding when a skeptic dies?
Our Judge-Jury-and-Executioner-in-Chief just ordered the killing of an American citizen without benefit of his right to a trial, to confront witness against him, to be presumed innocent until proven guilty, in a situation where that individual was not at the moment shooting at police or otherwise trying to kill someone. In any such circumstance, with a suspect that is not at that moment menacing life and limb, even if the person doing the killing is a peace officer this is first-degree murder.
Yes, the murder victim in this case is alleged to have committed heinous crimes, and certainly has done so, since terrorism is a heinous crime – but even a citizen accused of the most heinous crimes still has rights under the Constitution and the law.
With some of his AGW alarmist buddies now calling skeptics “terrorists,” that puts Obully’s actions in a new light for the skeptic community. Are we next on his hit list?
Attacks on my work aimed at undermining climate change science have turned me into a public figure.’
This media whore is kidding no one , his pimped his ‘work’ long and hard to any unquestioning press he could get his hands on, and had the rest of ‘the Team’ help him in this . Has with so many ways , even when he is being a PR slut he can’t stop lying .
Still , I wonder if this is the first step to him claiming he ‘had to ‘ drop the court cases becasue an ‘unfair’ legal system could not give such ‘public figuers ‘ justice ?
I’m loving it….
Go Jimbo!
I guess he could find a new career as a Pantomime Dame –
Shades of Frankie Howerd: “Infamy! Infamy! They’ve all got it in for me”